The Penalty for Pride
by Cody McCody
Summary: Everyone has an issue or two. Zoro’s, while tragic, is pretty simple. He has always felt comfortable enough with how he deals with it… but maybe he doesn’t have as much control over it as he thought. Well, at least it’s all just in his head, right


The Penalty for Pride  

Chapter One

   He opened his eyes onto that strange ceiling of pastels, a little surprised yet very pleased. The powder blues, ash greens and soft pinks all swirled together while at the same time sliding away from one another in an eye wrenching dance. _Like I'm inside a gigantic soap bubble._He considered not for the first time, mentally praising himself again on what a clever comparison it was.

   Unlacing his fingers his fingers from behind his head, Zoro sat up. He always tried to have this dream, always closed his eyes with the intention of ending up here, but it didn't actually work all that often. He had spoken with monks, priests, village sages, and even a self-proclaimed witch once; meditation had been the most often advised course of action. And he had become quite adept at it, he could slip into a trance at the drop of a hat, but it hadn't seemed to help his success rate in getting here.

   Pushing up onto one knee, a stab of sharp pain in his side set him back down onto his ass fast. _Stupid cheating-ass clown_. But it reminded him of the thing that _did_ seem to help him find this place. Being injured appeared to be a surefire way of getting this dream, though there was no logical connection that he could tell. Sometimes he got the uncomfortable suspicion that it had to do with feelings of failure. _No no no, stop being so weird_. He chided himself.   

   Resigning himself to remaining seated, he rubbed absently at the back of his closely cropped, mossy green hair and cast about for her. She was why he liked this dream so very much… almost to an obsessive degree he had to admit, but hey, every one had issues. The original source his 'issue' was gone; he still had his ambition and goal of course, but his _reason_ was a dead girl. Thus, when boiled down, he decided that it wasn't too terribly odd that his brain had produced this substitution of a sort.

   He didn't see her at first, just the grassy patch of earth he was sitting on and its loan oak tree. It was a rather small bit of land, stretching out perhaps ten feet away from him in every direction before abruptly blurring into gray nothingness. So, maybe he wasn't all that creative; he had tried to imagine into being more trees and a little creek, and even animals, but it hadn't worked so far. _Oh well…_ He thought. It wasn't like the scenery mattered anyhow. There was absolutely nothing to be heard either, other than his own steady breathing and the very light chiming of his three gold earrings as his head swiveled. 

   Out of the corner of his eye he saw something finally, and turned his head just in time to see the silhouette of a figure bowing before sheathing a sword at its hip. The colorless form turned towards him and began to walk forward. Zoro felt out the upper most hilt at his side. It was her, he was fairly certain, and this was just a dream. But still, dreams were not easy to control, there was no telling when his subconscious might throw something crazy out, and no way did he want to get his ass handed to him by an imaginary foe simply because he wasn't ready.

   As it approached, the form gained first a more defined shape and then color by the time it stepped onto the grass that surrounded him. Kuina looked much as she had the day she died: glossy black hair, large onyx eyes, pale cream skin, and a slender toned body. The differences were small: her hair was a bit longer, falling to her shoulders now, and she was taller of course. Looking at her, this way, the way he imagined her, he was pretty sure she would have been well pleased with such at this age; she was grown but still had a somewhat boyish figure. Her breasts were small, not much fuller than on the night their two thousandth and first duel, the night she had expressed such displeasure over her body's development. Remembering that still made him blush. _Man, you're and immature moron!_ He scolded himself. But yeah, the point was that she would have been happy and no doubt would have used it to its full advantage. He supposed that was why he saw figures sparing out in the gray sometimes when he first got here, he liked to think she was still following her art no matter where she was now.

   The Kuina of his mind's creation strode towards him with an arrogant and slightly vexed look on her cute face. No big surprise there since that was the expression he had seen her display most often in life. Her clothes on the other hand where somewhat of a puzzle to him. The tight brown leggings and sleeveless white gi looked perfectly sensible and functional, not a bad choice at all for a swordsman, but he couldn't recall having ever seen such an outfit before. Hmm, perhaps he was pretty creative after all… he could be a fashion designer! He blanched and nearly fell over as thoughts of fairies pranced through his mind.

   The katana at her hip, while not a puzzle at all, was much more disconcerting; he didn't like that he imagined her with a blood bought Yoake blade, but try to change it as he might, it never wavered.

   She came to a stop not more than a foot from him and glared down at him with something close to contempt. It didn't faze him though, he grinned up at her and attempted to stand once more despite the pain that shot through his side as his muscles flexed. He was stayed and placed back on his butt once more by her hand on his shoulder pushing him down; a forceful and impatient gesture that irked him a little. But he allowed it and watched without comment as she walked around to his other side then plopped down onto the grass next to him.

   She sat, legs akimbo, staring intently at the oozing wound in his side while he in turn watched her mouth, waiting for her to speak. He had to watch, for he knew from experience that he wouldn't likely hear. Her little lips didn't move though, instead she reached out a slender hand and carefully fingered aside the blood soaked cloth that obstructed her view. Zoro held his breath as the concern on her face turned to something else. She looked up at him, arched a single thin eyebrow and… and he didn't have time to react as he looked back down and watched her middle finger curl up and tuck behind her bent thumb only to be launched forward with force.

   "AAAAAH FUCK!!!" He cried out and rolled away from her. She had just thumped him in his damned wound!

   Seeing stars quickly turned to seeing red as he sat back up a couple feet away from her now. She was laughing! He couldn't hear it but he could see it, her head thrown back, mirth shading her face. He snarled with irritation and she immediately looked over at him. Yeah, _she_ could hear _him_, and he had a few choice words in mind for her. Those words were halted, however, as her small pink lips began to move. He stayed silent and watched, he thought he could read them sometimes, and occasionally a word or two out of her mouth _did_ come with a voice. It was usually words like 'stupid' and 'weak', but he wanted to hear them nonetheless.

   After she was through saying whatever it was she was saying (he thought he had recognized the words 'sad' and 'kidding me' from her lips… _damn it, it was his dream, why couldn't he understand?_) she shook her head and scooted closer to him.

   He gave her a wary look and she chuckled… and he _heard_ it. It was a light yet rich sound that made him instantly forget his displeasure and pain; even if she was laughing _at_ him, it was good to hear. But his brain went back to being cruel a second later, cutting out the sound again as she started talking once more. She seemed to notice as well, because she gave an inaudible sigh and went to signing instead. She pointed at the bloody gash she had just abused and then put her hands out palms up and shrugged as if to ask 'Well?'.

   "Ugh," Zoro shifted to a more comfortable position and tried to think of a way to tell it that would have impressed Kuina, not that much of anything had impressed her in real life. "A friend of mine, the captain of the ship I have been traveling on," he decided to leave out that the 'ship' was little more than a glorified rowboat. "got himself into some trouble." Skipping over some more details, he didn't really need to talk about what a goofball his captain was after all. "I went for the rescue and ended up taking on the captain of the pirates that were holding him."

   He watched Kuina's face closely for any reaction as he spoke. Somewhere back in a dream-aware part of his mind he knew it was ridiculous; she would react and behave as his memories and imagination dictated, but still, it still seemed important for some reason. Her expression appeared mildly interested, so he began to elaborate a bit.

   "The man knew who I was of course." His reputation and fame were important to him in this matter, naturally, since he had declared to her father all those years ago that the name Roronoa Zoro would be heard all the way up in the Heavens. "I told him that I wasn't really interested in fighting him, but he insisted. I made one pass with Toragari and that was that…" The spark of excitement he could now see in her big round eyes made him regret having to add, "Or so I had thought."

   "I mean come on! When a man is cut into four clean pieces it should be over right?" He exclaimed when she gave him a skeptical look. "But I hadn't accounted for the possibility of Devil's Fruit powers." He almost mumbled it.

   She shook her head in a disappointed manner and he scratched at his fuzzy green hairline at his forehead; she definitely wasn't going to like what he to say next. "It was the Bara Bara Fruit, his severed hand got me from behind with a dagger."

   Kuina gave a hiss through angrily bared teeth (perfectly audible this time). Whether it was for his having so foolishly let his guard down or for that most shameful act of attacking from behind, he did not know. _I was careless, but damn that Buggy._ He wasn't all that surprised though, from his experience as a pirate hunter, the average pirate was little concerned with honor. Zoro himself had not yet fully come to grips with his status as one… but it didn't _have_ to be that way, Luffy was undeniably different after all.

   With his much trimmed down story concluded, he stretched his black pant clad legs out, slowly, still mindful of his injury, and leaned back onto his elbows. This would be a nice place to take a nap, if he were not _already_ napping. And that was a tangling and uncomfortable line of thought for someone not philosophically inclined, so he went back to thinking about Kuina. He wondered if he would ever get good enough at this dream for them to spar with each other. That would be fun, but then it would probably be nothing more than a mirror of his own current skills in her image. Another pointless line of thought he decided.

   He looked over at her, she seemed to be lost in thought as well, no longer watching him intently as she had while he had spoke. Instead, she seemed to be looking at some far off point over and past his shoulder. He used her absentness to study her more closely. She looked slender and lithe; the subtle outlining of muscles on her exposed arms spoke of regular training. She would by no means be powerful but she was unmistakably strong enough to be effective with the right sword style. There were so many ancient forms that were dismissed by modern swordsmen as being ineffective and obsolete, requiring grace and speed that was often sacrificed in the name of raw power… he could imagine her executing such forms beautifully. He almost grinned at the thought of his true rival coming at him with moves he had never seen, techniques he would have to learn to defend against, but then he noticed that she was chewing on her bottom lip and fingering the hilt of that damned Blood sword she wore.

   A moment longer and it was starting to get to him, so he broke the silence with, "Is something troubling you?"

   Her shiny black eyes came back into focus abruptly and she nodded her head in an almost solemn way. Then she gave him what he could only read as a sad smile before her eyes drifted slowly shut. That took him aback somewhat since he had seldom ever seen her smile at him other than when she was making fun of him or when she was gloating after a match… well, there had been that all important night which was etched second by second into his memory, but that had been a special exception.

   He was left no time to ponder over it though as her chest expanded with a deep breath and her thumb pushed her katana out that bare inch that spoke volumes.

   Every finely tuned muscle in Zoro's body snapped to taut in an instant, his wound protested but he ignored it this time. One of his own blades had been eased in its sheath in that same split second. Tearing his dark eyes away from her now disturbingly still figure, he peered back over his shoulder to where her gaze had been.

   The small hairs on the back of his neck rose, along with an unbidden growl from the suddenly icy pit of his stomach. He was kneeling, ready to spring, a white knuckled grip the lightest of his three weapons, but he did not draw it.

   A tiger, its orange and black fur smoking, stalked towards them. The beast was not on fire but tendrils of gray rose up from its coat, head to tail, and wafted back behind it as it moved steadily forward. Where it stepped it left smoldering and scorched paw prints in the springy thick grass.

   Equally alarming, yet somehow far more disturbing, was the massive flock of carrion birds that trailed it. The sound of so many immense wings, (packed together so closely that he saw them collide in a spray of dull black feathers several times in just that short moment) should have created a thunder at this close range… yet he heard nothing.

   They swarmed after and circled above the big cat in a cloud of dark mangled plumage, gnarled red faces, and angry hooked beaks that obscured the soap bubble sky from view. The tiger appeared to pay them little mind however, even as one of the birds broke away from the rest and dove towards the profusely smoking creature. It struck hard, though astoundingly with no visible effect on its target. The tiger didn't so much as flinch or falter in its path but the giant bird careen off of it in a violent rebound. Zoro watched in horror as the bird landed on its back several paces off and was swiftly set upon and engulfed by its fellow scavengers. An ear piercing screech reverberated through the air and was cut short as few stray spurts of blood escaped between the bodies of the feeding mob. Why he had been able hear that when he could not hear their wing beats was beyond him to wonder.

   This was too much. The dream had become a nightmare. Kuina or no Kuina, it was no longer pleasant. _This shit's too freaky, I need to wake the fuck up_.

   But before he could even put any effort into it, Kuina stepped in front of him. Her katana was drawn, yet her posture was hesitant and her stance was a defensive one that he could not put a name to. Was she intending to protect him? _Damn it!_ Even though this was just a dream, and she was just his mind's creation, his pride would not allow him to try and leave now.

   Her head swung cautiously to the side so that he was seeing her profile but here eyes stayed glued to the smoldering tiger. She mouthed the single word 'go'.

   Zoro opened his mouth to say no, but oddly enough, the big cat beat him to it.

   "No, child." It spoke without opening its jaw… all things considered, that wasn't too astounding at this point. "I have things to say to Roronoa Zoro now that I find him here."

   It was a deep and gruff male's voice, _Kind of what you would expect from a tiger._ Zoro thought to himself, and then smacked himself on the forehead for it, _Aw hell, I'm losing my marbles!_ "This is stupid." He said out loud.

   Kuina's black eyes shifted briefly to him in a sharp glare, but the tiger just chuckled and seated itself on its haunches. Eerily, the swarm of carrion eaters followed suit; settling down to blanket a full half of the small green island with their dark mass. In a few clusters they bickered and snapped at one another, but for the most part they had tucked away their wings and gave the appearance of waiting patiently.

   Fighting back the gooseflesh that tried to crawl over his sun-darkened skin at the sight, Zoro asked, "Who, What are you? And why am I dreaming about you?"

   With that Kuina rounded on him, her blade was sheathed in a flash but her eyes were intense and had a dangerous glint. She was speaking so fast and heatedly that he couldn't even attempt to read her lips. Over her head (she was taller than she had been when she died but he stood a good six or seven inches higher) he saw the great predator cock its head to the side, for all the world looking as if it were amused.

   He couldn't hear her, but he could hear it, and it spoke, "You still refuse to listen I see. You still don't want to know."

   "_You_ listen bastard, why don't you just go away so that I can have a nice nap?" Zoro snapped as he sidestepped Kuina, his hand still threatening on the white scabbard and hilted katana that had once been hers.

   The cat seemed unconcerned, and in an almost insulting manner it turned its head back and gave its side a quick swipe with a dark pink tongue where the doomed bird had hit it as if its fur was mussed, which it was not of course. That added more smoke to its already clouded and ever rising aura as tendrils escaped out from between its teeth before closing its mouth again to face the agitated swordsman.

   "You asked what I was..." There was an unfriendly smile in that voice now, though Zoro would never have been able to explain how he could tell. "I am death without reason."

   The green haired man felt his stomach turn with unease but he was too well disciplined to let it show. He was hard pressed to keep his composer though as the tiger's voice kept coming at him.

   "Kuina…" It said and Zoro flinched at the pulse of rage through his veins at hearing her name from such a monster. It noticed, and with a peculiar purr in its voice, continued on in a taunting manner, "Yes, Kuina and I, we are quite close. I am sure you have noticed the fine weapon that I gifted her with."

   There was a stir among the mass of birds, angry squawks, jumps, and flapping of wings as if they were suddenly anxious to take flight. He didn't care, his heart was pounding, his fingertips hot with too much blood being forced into them. He had turned without realizing it and was staring at the malevolent blade which adorned the side of his first friend. He wanted to snatch it from her, wanted to take it back with him and chunk it into the deepest part of the sea he could find.

   She seemed to sense his intentions and turned her body as if to block his way.

   "You have no right to take away what I have earned, Zoro."

   Her voice crashed into him like an enormous wave of solid ice. His strong rough hands shook, his breath felt like fire in his lungs, inside his head his own voice howled, _This__ is insane, it's only a dream! Why don't I wake up?_

   The smoldering tiger was laughing again; confused and blindingly furious, Zoro pivoted and drew the gripped katana in one fluid motion… and was immediately slapped across his head and knocked to the ground by an massive and lightening fast paw. Reflexively, he rolled away and landed in a crouch a few feet off. In his head (even though the voice was still insisting this was just a dream) he made a quick assessment of his situation. He wasn't bleeding much, he hadn't taken any new wounds; but that meant that the overgrown cat had only batted at him. He was affronted and relieved at the same time. To make matters worse, Kuina was now kneeling next to him and had placed a staying hand on arm.

   "Please stop." Her voice was mute to him once more but he could read it easily.

   His eyes, such a dark green that they were usually taken for black, shifted to her hip where the Yoake blade rested. But she silently demanded his gaze, and when he met it he was nearly overwhelmed with all the challenge and pride those eyes had ever held in life. As always, he leapt without thinking to answer that challenge… even if they neither so much as twitched a muscle, their wills locked into an epic struggle that was as thrilling as any encounter of blades.

   Seemingly distant now, he heard the belligerent tiger's voice once again, "You want to be the greatest? You wish to be known as the best in the world? You are a joke here, to us, Roronoa Zoro. Only this ignorant, stubborn child believes in you. You are a joke and her ultimate disgrace. You are pathetic."

   Her eyes went round as saucers and… And the word exploded around him. He launched himself from the bed just before a huge slab of wall crashed down onto it. Snapping beams warned of the structures imminent failure. The small room's only window was shattered and collapsing rapidly under the weight of debris, but he pushed off with every ounce of strength in him and darted through the opening out into daylight just in time.

   Holding his head, not feeling steady enough to move again just yet unless he absolutely had to, he heard Luffy call out. "Hey, Zoro! Are you alive?"

   "Ugh! That's one hell of an alarm clock!" He answered through the dust nonchalantly. But inside he was far more shaken than any little explosion could account for.

   What kind of twisted-ass scenario had that been for his brain to create? He couldn't be losing his mind, he had too far to go yet.


End file.
